“Ask the Pope": the RCC in Russia refuses to comment on the ban of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church

On August 22, 2024, Archbishop Pavel Pezzi, head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow and chairman of the Russian Catholic Bishops’ Conference, refused to comment on the situation with the banning of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by the adoption of the relevant law by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. Pezzi noted that “since we are talking about an objectively complex situation in another state,” any comments on this matter are better received directly from the Vatican Secretariat of State. The website of the Russian Catholic Bishops’ Conference reports that.

“In connection with the requests received by the RCBC to express its position on the adoption in Ukraine of the law “On the prohibition of the activities in Ukraine of religious organizations associated with Russia,” I consider it necessary to point out that since we are talking about an objectively complex situation in another state, all official comments on this matter fall within the competence of the Holy See, in particular, the Secretariat of State. At the same time, since we are talking, inter alia, about the issue of human rights, I consider it my duty to recall the teaching of the Catholic Church, according to which the true source of human rights — universal, inviolable, inalienable — is not simply the will of men, State order, civil authorities, but man himself and God, his Creator. Compendium of Social Teaching, 153); that among these rights the right to freedom of conscience and religious freedom is one of the highest goods and one of the most serious duties of every nation (ibid., 553); and that society and the state should neither force a person to act against his conscience nor forbid him to act according to its dictates (ibid., 421),” — Pezzi noted.